CIDEC Seminar
“Impactful Foundational Literacy and Numeracy Interventions in Southern Africa & the Indian Ocean Islands”
OISE, University of Toronto
252 Bloor St. West.
Room 7-105
Toronto ON M5S1V6
Canada
“Learning poverty” has emerged as a key signifier in the international discourse about schooling in the Global South. Using case studies from the Southern Africa Development Community (a grouping of Southern African and Indian Ocean countries), the presentation explores the varied system-level responses to improving foundational literacy and numeracy and the role that global funders, regional NGOs and international agencies play in shaping national educational agendas.
About the Speaker
Dr. Brahm Fleisch
Brahm Fleisch is a Professor of Education Policy and Head of the Division of Education Leadership, Policy, and Skills at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, and a consultant to SADC/UNICEF. Brahm did his graduate studies at Columbia University in New York. After moving back to South Africa in 1990, he lsectured at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. From 1995 to 2000, he served as a school district director in the newly formed Gauteng Department of Education. His books include Managing Educational Change: The State and School Reform in South Africa; Primary Education in Crisis: Why South African Schoolchildren Underachieve in Reading and Mathematics, (co-authored with Stu Woolman) The Constitution in the Classroom: Law and Education in South Africa, 1994-2008 and The Education Triple Cocktail: System-wide Instructional Reform in South Africa. Working with a team from the South African Department of Basic Education in South Africa, his research program focuses on system-wide improvement of early-grade learning in the Global South. He is currently leading a UNICEF initiative to support government-led policy on foundational literacy and numeracy in the Southern African Development Community.
